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Friday, September 16, 2016

The Scorch Trials

by James Dashner

Date Read: 9/14/16Rating: ★ ★ ★

The entire time I was reading this story I was blown away by
how different it was from the movie. For both “The Maze Runner” and “The Scorch
Trials” I had watched the movie first. I
love the movies, I’m just wondering why they chose to make the second movie so
vastly different from the book. It’s almost just loosely based on the
book. But that also made it fun to read
the book because I still wasn’t sure what to expect.

I feel like this book was a little slower than the first
book. Most of the book was about the gang traveling across the desert. Yeah, there were some action scenes here and
there, but it was still basically just a traveling book. I wish it had been a little more exciting and
diverted from the Scorch more often.

Thomas also passed out or slept (and dreamed) a LOT
throughout this book. It really slowed
everything down. While I get that the author is making it real, it just really
stopped the story and jarred me out of my rhythm.

The change between Thomas and Teresa in this book was done
really well, I thought. It was very believable and just like Thomas, the reader
has no idea who to trust. I definitely have some strong emotions about this and
I tend to side with Thomas.

Several new characters are introduced in this book. Aris is
an interesting character. I’m still on the fence about him. I liked Brenda a
lot…but I didn’t like how forward she was. But once I got past that I really
liked her.

We get a little bit more information on what the world is
like now. There are still plenty of questions left open. The main ones being “What
the heck is the killzone?” and “How is torturing children going to create a
cure?”. Dashner does a wonderful job of
giving you just enough to keep reading and wanting so much more. Curious as to
what this is all really about.

I hated the ending. It felt like the author just had a long
story and decided to chop it right there. There was absolutely no wrap up at
all. The story just ended. All of a sudden there were no more pages. What the
heck? Ok, I get that you want a cliffhanger, but you can still successfully
have a cliffhanger in your book while still having a little wrap up in other
areas.

A little disappointed in this book following The Maze
Runner. It’s still entertaining enough to get through, but it definitely took
me a while to get through it … i.e. had to re-request from the library several
times before I finished it… I’m looking forward
to reading The Death Cure to finally get some answers and see how this series
ends.

Friday, September 9, 2016

Max at Night

by Ed Vere

Date Read: 9/8/16Rating: ★ ★ ★★

I received a copy of Max at Nightfrom the publisher, Sourcebooks, in
exchange for an honest review. I’m so thankful they sent me this because my
daughter and I will enjoy this story for years to come!

This book follows Max, a little kitten, as he is ready to go
to bed, but he can’t find the moon to say goodnight. He goes on an adventure
trying to get as high as he can to find the moon to say goodnight. Then he
follows his steps back home to bed.

This sweet book is a wonderful bedtime book for toddlers and
preschoolers. There aren’t that many words on the page and the length is
perfect to help get a child ready for bed but not too long that they get bored.
The illustrations are large and simple with a subdued color palette which keeps
it from being too stimulating before bed. The repetition is perfect for
preschoolers…you can ask the child what does Max have to do next to get back
home?

My daughter and I really enjoyed this story and we are so
thankful to Sourcebooks for providing us a copy.

Enter below for a chance to win your own copy of Max at
Night and an original sketch by author and illustrator Ed Vere!

Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Toothiana: Queen of the Tooth Fairy Armies (#3)

by William Joyce

Date Read: 9/3/16Rating: ★ ★ ★

The first thing I noticed about this book when we finally
got the audiobook from the library was that is significantly shorter than the
previous novels. Well, just be warned, that is because it ends on a huge
cliffhanger and it just says “To Be Continued”.
SERIOUSLY?!

This book was actually much slower in pace than the previous
books as well. It has a lot more background on Toothiana than we’ve gotten on
the other characters. Between this and
the shorter length, there didn’t seem to be a whole lot of action in this book.
I did really enjoy the background story on Toothiana. It’s pretty tragic and
yet hopeful also.

I’m really interested to see what happens to Katherine and
also to our heroes as their journey continues. Pitch is a pretty sympathetic
villain – while he’s doing evil now, he wasn’t always that way and he lost his
daughter. Will Pitch and Katherine end
up having some sort of connection that helps save him from the evil?

I really enjoy these storylines but I’m disappointed that
book 4 in the series is not on audio. Someone needs to remedy that FAST. My husband and I have both been listening to
these on our commute to work – so having to read a physical book will be much
more time consuming for us.